Around 8% of young people are thought to hear voices at some stage in childhood, with up to 75% having a one-off experience of voice hearing. This makes hearing voices about as common for young people as having asthma or dyslexia . For many children, then, it seems that hearing voices is a pretty normal part of growing up .

Research shows, the experience of hearing voices that others can’t hear – also called auditory verbal hallucinations in traditional psychiatric terms – is not usually upsetting for many children. The experience of hearing voices also doesn’t tend to last too long – meaning it can often be something children grow out of or overcome in time.